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[RAM]

Worshipping natural selection like a god is ignorant, look at your options, there are far more than blindly giving in to simple pleasures(which, by the way, will kill you, aggressively eating is one of those things that has traditionally helped humans survive, if we don't try to meddle with evolution we will suffer, alot...)

[x2yzh9]

EDIT:Was in a RAEG when i posted this. Edited so..everyone feels bettar.

^_^

[Vester]

Don't start fights.

I have no idea where you're getting the idea that atheists are atheists because they've failed at life. Many of my atheistic friends simply couldn't reconcile the idea of a higher power with what was right in front of them, and I respect that they followed their hearts and minds.

There are plenty of religious people who are chubby, the same way there are plenty who are skinny. You don't classify people like that because it doesn't matter. We're all people.

[Puzzlemaker]

I think it's just that people like that tend to be more noticeable.  That's all.

[G-Flex]

I have no idea what the original text of that post said, but yes, the worst examples of any group tend to be the loudest and most noticeable.

[Killas[SiN]]

I have no idea what the original text of that post said, but yes, the worst examples of any group tend to be the loudest and most noticeable.

They are the only type of people that we notice.

[G-Flex]

Unless you ever talk to halfway-sane people, of course.

[Starver]

Worshipping natural selection like a god is ignorant,

Worshipping anything like a god is ignorant, probably.  Inclusive of gods.  For there are enough contrary opinions out there to preclude the possibility of proving ones own method to be correct (although feel free to make your own assumptions and live by them).

One thought experiment of mine is that there may be a God Of Logic out there who may or may not have set up the universe last Tuesday, January 21st 1963, or 4000BC, but set it up to look exactly like it has a full history of arising from a singularity of a big bang/whatever (if not actually done so).  The point being that the beings that inhabit the universe are free[1] to invent their own way of looking at the world, but the only ones that are heading towards salvation are those that analyse the world and come up with the idea that it is a logical progression without divine hand (for He set the world up like that).  Any being who worships any deity, inclusive of the GOL Himself, is being illogical, and thus Unworthy.

And, apart from that, the fact that a baby brought up by parents of religious inclination A (christian, islamic, hindu, no belief, full on disbelief, whatever) is likely to be of the same inclination at least as long as nobody else comes along to influence the child/teenager/adult means that no deity worth their salt should condemn anyone on arrival to the pearly-gate-equivalents for their particular flavour (or lack of) belief, only their actions[1, again] during their time.  Maybe go the way of the Narnian Chronicles: "evil actions made in the name of [good deity] Aslan are accepted by [evil god] Tash", with good actions in the name of Tash vice-versa.  Whether there are indeed multiple gods or just a large set of different hammers and false moustaches.

I would say that those who are truly damned (if indeed anyone is) are those that pursue Pascal's Wager, for they are trying[1, once again, you get the idea] to fool a god (and inevitable failing).  Or maybe I'm damned for 'spoiling the fun' in overanalysing it.  There's nothing to say that it isn't a God Of Illogic who is spoiling for a fight by making it an arguable point and being completely arbitrary (within the bounds of their own free wiill issue) about what the 'right' opinion is.


[1] Arguments of free will aside, of course.

[Andir]

Worshipping natural selection like a god is ignorant, look at your options, there are far more than blindly giving in to simple pleasures(which, by the way, will kill you, aggressively eating is one of those things that has traditionally helped humans survive, if we don't try to meddle with evolution we will suffer, a lot...)

I'm not sure where you get that I'm "worshiping" anything.  (if you are referring to me...) that's just the way that makes the most sense logically.  I don't sit around on a Sunday praying to the almighty Nature or have a license plate that decries that I am random particles.  That's just the way I see makes the most sense.  There doesn't have to be an entity involved in the design or construct of this universe.  Just random happenings that made it pass the first and millionth test of time.

[RAM]

Abandoning the possibility of other options simply because you happen to be given one that seems to work for you is exactly what people do when they worship a god. Natural selection may have worked, and may continue to work, but that doesn't mean that it is the best option and that our environment hasn't changed too quickly for it to keep up. Whether The Grandmaster tells you that they will lead you to heaven, you just know that something is watching over your, or you have been taught that the strong survive and the weak are discarded if you don't assess its validity and simply accept it then you are obeying blind faith...

[Andir]

Abandoning the possibility of other options simply because you happen to be given one that seems to work for you ...

How about it being the only one with a shred of evidence?

[Zironic]

Budhism makes the most sense. Budha didn't believe in miracles, he believed in life lesson. In fact, there is no god really, just transcendence through doing good. People who don't follow the path, or are evil - are not held to be wicked, they just are not ready personally to follow the path. They will however, when it's their time.

[RAM]

Budhism makes the most sense.

Requires a thorough analysis of all alternatives...

[Starver]

Natural selection may have worked, and may continue to work, but that doesn't mean that it is the best option and that our environment hasn't changed too quickly for it to keep up.

Being acutely aware that I might be taking this out of context, becauseof the intermingled philosophies being concentrated on in this thread, just to say that there are observable situations where the environment does change too quickly for natural selection to keep up.  Witness (frexample) the cloud forests of the Amazon, where the clouds are gradually 'lifting off' the top of hills, leaving creatures used to the moist air 'stranded' on a 'dry island'.

Now natural selection encompasses all of nature's pressures (inclusive of unintended but natural outcomes of human interference, I would argue[1]) and does not preclude unknown, unobserved or unidentified pressures.  At the risk of immitating the God Of The Gaps argument, NS doesn't seem to be outdated or in any way imminently disproved.  Which is not to say that I'd take it as a Gospel-like be-all-and-end-all explanation, as I'd be curious as to the whys and wherefores, rather than take it as read even when novel effects are seen...

[1] The argument could be that as we are part of nature (albeit a perverse one, to some people's views) that we are as much a part of the natural system as any other, but I make the above differentiation to exclude deliberate animal husbandry and the likes of breeding dogs for anthropo-aesthetic reasons that preserve/induce/fail-to-weed-out severe defects that would get removed from a human-free breeding programme.

[Zironic]

Budhism makes the most sense.

Requires a thorough analysis of all alternatives...

I run on the general assumption most of religions don't make sense.